The pause was only momentary. He went across the room, aware of being glad that he had found her by herself. They were all thrown together, made closer and more human to each other, by the danger outside, but the alliance of shared privacies was a different and more compelling one. For himself, the weakness of wanting where he was not wanted. For her, the ennui of ceasing to want altogether. And, for both of them, loneliness.
She looked up as he approached, and he said, smiling, “We’ve barred every part of the house except this. It should be secure enough now.”
He had not, of course, intended to touch on their earlier conversation again; it was enough that it had taken place, that there had been an act of understanding, of recognition. But he was unprepared for her reaction to him; it showed confusion, uneasiness—distaste even. She said, “Yes. I heard all the hammering.”
It was a minimum response, and plainly meant as such. . She accompanied it with a faint, polite smile, and returned at once to her book. He stood in front of her, feeling a fool. After a moment, he said, “George is opening the bar. Do you feel like a drink?”
“No.” She shook her head. “I don’t think so, thank you.” She looked up again briefly. “Don’t let me stop you, though.”
The dismissal had been underlined. He felt annoyance and resentment, chiefly that she should, as he suspected, have thought him crass enough to be capable of reopening a topic she might want to remain closed. He had an impulse, in view of her present behavior, to do exactly that —to tell her that it was her self-centeredness, her withdrawal from other people, that made life pointless to her. He resisted it, but continued to stand there, partly because of uncertainty, partly through perverseness. Then he heard the different sound and said, involuntarily, “What was that?”
She looked up again. “What?”
“Listen.” He hurried across to the double French windows that gave access to the veranda, and opened them. “Now!”
She put her book down and came to stand beside him. He saw that the indifference had gone, that she looked excited, but he was too excited himself to feel any satisfaction because of that. She said “An airplane! And fairly close.”
“Helicopter.” He called out, “George, Selby!” The mist out there swirled, as though rocked by the uneven rhythm of the engine note. He said happily, “That’s a pretty good noise to hear, isn’t it?”
They came in from the bar, carrying their glasses. They both looked pleased; George was grinning broadly. They stepped out onto the veranda, and Douglas followed them. The helicopter was very close, not more than a couple of hundred feet away, Douglas guessed.
Selby said, “Isn’t he taking something of a chance, in this soup?”
“Must be thinning,” George said. “He’ll be skimming the top of it.” He stared up into the mist. “Somebody up there likes me. And I like him. I really, really do.”
“He can’t come down,” Selby objected, “and we certainly can’t jump that high. It doesn’t leave us a great deal better off.”
“They’re doing a recce,” George said. “I suppose they’ve had a forecast for mist clearing, and they’re maybe a bit worried about us. We’ve been cut off for over four days, after all.” He grinned again. “Even if they can’t get to us, it’s nice to know they’re thinking of us.”
Selby stared out. “I think perhaps it is clearing slightly. Not much. But it’s looking a fraction brighter.”
“Yes” George said, “it is.”
By the time lunch was ready, there was no doubt that the mist was thinner. Visibility was up to fifty or sixty feet, and there was a distinct brightening in the quarter where the sun would now be. The helicopter had long gone, but the day still had a cheering aspect. Mandy had contrived to turn flour and water, salt beef, tinned vegetables and various dried herbs into a rich dumpling stew, and George served a Dole Pinot Noir with it, heavy, satisfying, almost black. He was very happy, and kept the glasses filled.
Eventually, Selby objected. “We’re going to be fit for nothing this afternoon, unless we go a bit easier.”
“What do we need to be fit for?” George said. “We’ve done all the bolting and barring.”
“We were going to make a sortie to get hold of one of them. Or lay a trap, or something.”
“No point in that,” George said. “The mist’s clearing. As soon as it’s lifted, we’ll have the chopper back. They’ll get us out of here, and then you can hunt your specimen at your leisure. Nothing in it.”
Elizabeth said, “Has anyone heard any voices since the helicopter was over? I haven’t.”
“They’ve cleared off out of the way, I reckon,” George said. “Probably scared the hell out of them.”
Selby said doubtfully, “I wonder.”
“Anyway, the thing to do is sit tight.” George filled his own glass to the brimming point “Sit tight and wait. Time’s on our side.”
11
Relief displayed was, as a matter of elementary logic, a measure of prior tension. George, Selby realized now, had been under a greater strain than had appeared: hence this euphoria. Mandy brought tea into the salon after lunch, and George suggested brandies. None of the others accepted, but he poured a large measure for himself. His face was somewhat flushed from the drink he had already taken, but otherwise he looked all right. He would have a good capacity for alcohol, and probably not show much up to the point of passing out.
With the slightly intoxicated relief came other things. He got on the subject of Selby’s children, and the possibility that they might be anxious about their parents. Selby shrugged.
“I shouldn’t think they’ll have been told anything. They’re both at pretty sensible schools. We got cards off to them the day before things closed in on us. And we can telephone to them as soon as we get to Nidenhaut.”
George stared at him. “And, after all, it isn’t as though they see much of you, is it? How old are they, anyway?”
“Cassie’s eleven. Mike’s eight.”
“Eight? And how long has the poor little sod been away at boarding school?”
“Since September.”
“Christ! It doesn’t bear thinking of.”
Selby said mildly, “We had a good look at the school before he went there. In fact, we ruled out my old place because we thought it a little on the spartan side. This one is pretty comfortable. Pleasant, too, and with nice people. He’s settled in well. He enjoyed coming home for Christmas, but he was cheerful enough about going back afterwards.”
“You were sent away at eight, too, I suppose?”
“Yes.”
“And enjoyed it?”
“I remember crying a bit, the first few nights. After that I enjoyed it.”
“Because you had it to go through, it’s O.K. for him, too. That’s it, isn’t it?”
“It’s not exactly the way I would put it.”
“Shove him through the mill, and he’s all right for life. Prep school and public school. Who gives a damn what happens to him, as long as he’s stamped in the right mold?”
Selby said, “There are a number of ways in which early life can be tough. You know that as well as anyone.”
“I wasn’t packed away at the age of eight. I can imagine what my ma would have said if anyone had tried that one on.”
“Different people see things differently. Variety is supposed to be a spice, isn’t it?”
George said disgustedly, “Variety! Where’s the variety in a set of carbon copies?”
“Well, between species, then.” He smiled at him easily. “Your species and mine.”
He had made the remark out of idle curiosity, which was satisfied by the deepening of the color in George’s face. An unkindness, he admitted, but there had been provocation. And if you put on protective mimicry, it was not a good idea to shout anti-slogans to the tribal cries. The man’s sense of fitness should prevent it. But could not, of course. A man might deny class, creed, country, but the chip on the shoulder was something he carried fo
r life.
He went on, willing to placate now. “Actually, I am opposed to chucking kids indiscriminately into schools. There are some children who never should be sent away, and a lot of schools that no child should ever be entrusted to. And in a different kind of society, values would be different. One has to do the best with what one has. I’m a rule-of-thumb man, not an idealist.”
Which was true, he thought, and reasonably honest. It was pleasant to ameliorate, in one’s small way, the human lot, but not a burning concern. To that extent his work was peripheral to his life, not central. What was central, he wondered? Elizabeth? Or good living—or self-esteem? The question, he decided, was a dull one, and he dropped it.
George said, “I’m opposed to the whole thing. The British are the only nation in the world that go in for it. Because they’re too bloody idle to take the trouble to look after their own kids.”
He had recovered himself, but he was talking loudly.
“There may be something,” Selby said blandly, “in what you say.”
Shortly after, George broke off, on the excuse of seeing to the furnace. He was, plainly, still angry with Selby, and probably with himself also. No, Selby thought, despite the provocation he had been wrong to let himself be drawn. One owed a duty to the weaker brethren, for one’s own peace of mind if nothing else. He went to the bookcase, but found little of interest. He was leafing through a work, in French, on ophthalmology, and speculating as to how it had come to be here, when the door from the dining room opened. He turned, and saw Diana.
“Well,” he said, “I thought you were all busy playing Monopoly.”
“I’ve been wiped out. I was looking for someone to talk to.”
And where was the book, he asked himself, one thousandth part as attractive as a girl, pretty and young and setting herself out to please? He said warmly, “Go no further. You’ve found him.”
She smiled and went to the French windows. “It’s looking so much brighter,” she said. “The sun’s almost shining. Can’t we go outside?”
Selby stood beside her, and inhaled her scent with pleasure.
“I don’t see why not. As far as the veranda, at any rate. But we’d better put something a little warmer on first. I would reckon that it’s colder than you think out there.”
They got their coats and went through to the veranda. It was cold, but less raw than it had been. They leaned against the balustrade, their arms not quite touching, and looked out. There was still not much to see: the snow in front of the house, the heap of stacked logs, and the outhouses beyond them. Seventy-five feet, perhaps. And patchy —mist swirled in, clouded across the open space before them, slowly dispersed. Too tricky to risk a helicopter in, especially in this kind of country. But clearing. There was a pearly gleam all around them, as though they were in the center of some huge frosted egg.
Diana said, “It’s good to be outside. I hate being shut up in a house for too long.”
“Yes,” Selby said. “I’m with you in that.”
“Or, worse still, in a flat. I rather hate flats. Do you live in a flat, Selby?”
He nodded. “A gloomy place, off the Cromwell Road. But we do have a little place in Kent we can repair to at the week’s end.”
“Kent? Lovely! What part?”
“Near the Sussex border. Not far from Hawkhurst.”
“Yes, gorgeous! Especially in the spring.”
She spoke with enthusiasm, and the right small touch of wistfulness. And at this point, obviously, it would be reasonable to say that she must come down with them some weekend. No, my little one, he thought, the plans I have for you do not embrace weekends at the cottage, with or without Elizabeth in the offing. In the country, maybe, but a different part of the country. Suffolk, perhaps. There was that charming pub on the river; and flat landscapes, he felt, tended to bring out the liveliness in a girl.
“Pleasant enough,” he agreed. He waved his arm toward the point where the sun’s disk, for a moment, almost showed through. “If I were of a religious turn of mind, I think heliolatry would be my pigeon!”
She stared at him, laughing. “Heli-what?”
“Sun worship. Did you see the sign outside that chalet, on the way up to Nidenhaut?”
“No. What sign?”
“In French, and carved in a great chunk of wood. It said, give or take the nuances of my translation, ‘The sun is the fatherland—to follow the one is to serve the other.’ ”
“What does that mean?”
He grinned. “I’m not sure. I like the sound of it, though.” She dropped unexpectedly into earnestness. The blue eyes looked at him solemnly.
“Do you take anything seriously, Selby?”
“Lots of things.”
“What?”
“The small things. I leave the big ones to people with more profound minds and more elevated natures. Why, do you take life seriously?”
She said mournfully, “I’m afraid not. I try to, from time to time.”
“Don’t try. The beauty of life is this, that each should act in conformity with his nature and his business.”
“Who said that? Shakespeare?”
“No, though he might well have done. An ex-member of my profession used the quotation to wind up a very sensible book he wrote, but I’ve forgotten where it came from.”
There was a pause while she thought about it.
“Yes, I suppose it is sensible. Except that one doesn’t always know what one’s nature is meant to be. Or one’s business.” She gave him a quick look. “People have mad moments.”
She was referring, possibly, to the night before last, and the interrupted kiss. Interrupted, he remembered with a small inward shiver of distaste, for him, not for her. It had not been mentioned between them since. He wondered whether to tell her about the face, here in daylight with the mists thinning all around them, but decided against it. He was against connecting kisses with unpleasantness.
“Nothing wrong with mad moments,” he said, “time and place being appropriate.”
She made a restless movement, which brought their arms into contact, and stood back, her gloved hands on the rail.
“So cooped up. How long before we get away, do you think?”
“Tomorrow, probably.”
“Do you really think so?”
“You’ll be back behind your typewriter in less than forty-eight hours.”
“No, I’m not looking forward to that”
“Cast your eye further ahead. Those walks through the park, counting the crocuses. And just a few more months before you start queuing for the Proms. After all …”
“Look!”
She was staring at the mist. Selby looked in the same direction, but saw nothing.
“What was it?”
“I thought I saw something move. It looked …
“What did it look like?”
“Andy.”
“It could be.” He listened. “No voices. They’re keeping quiet at present. They may be scouting around, though. What was he doing?”
“I don’t think he was doing anything. Standing still.”
“No one else?”
“Not that I saw.” She shivered. “I had a nightmare last night, about all this.”
“It is nightmarish. But nearly over.”
“I was at home,” she said, “in the flat, alone at night. Sylvia was out, and I was doing some mending. And the door opened and Ruth Deeping came in. I wasn’t frightened at first, because all I remembered was the first part of the holiday, and I thought how nice it was that she had found my address and come to see me. It was still all right when Leonard came in. I asked them to sit down and said I would make some tea. But when I went through to the kitchen, the boy was there, Andy, lying dead on that table with the boxes round him, and I remembered, and wanted to run away, but the only way out was through the room the other two were in …” She gave a small laugh. “How silly these things are when you think of them the next day.”
“Y
es.”
He spoke absently. Out there, at the limit of visibility —was there something, or was it merely imagination, sparked off by what Diana had seen, or thought she had seen? The mist billowed closer, and whatever it was had gone. In any case, what would it matter if one did see them, any of them? There was nothing one could do about it, and at a distance they were not a danger.
“I used to have nightmares,” she said, “when I was a little girl. Or the same one, over and over again. It was an old man, and I couldn’t scream, and I tried to run, but my feet wouldn’t move. Lots of people have one something like that, don’t they?”
Selby nodded. “Where was your old man?”
“In a garden. With a wall round it.”
“Mine was in a wood. I suppose he would be even worse by the time he got round to you. Twenty years older.”
“What makes people have them?”
“Fear, I think. And suggestibility. And parents warning children about dangers they can’t begin to comprehend.” He looked at her. “Are you cold? Do you want to go inside?”
She shook her head. “Not really. I’d rather stay out.” She put a hand on his arm. “It will be over soon, won’t it?”
“Very soon.” She was not much more than a child still, with a child’s helplessness. He had a feeling of protectiveness toward her, untouched by desire. “The mist will have cleared by evening. They’ll probably send the helicopter back up here then. We’ll very likely be in Nidenhaut tonight, dancing at Putzi’s.”
“It would be fun.”
Her hand rested on his arm. He put his own hand over it, and patted it. The mist came in suddenly with a bite of cold, mocking his hopeful words. Her hand moved, and gripped his. In a moment, the mist was all around them, a cloud which made it impossible to see more than a foot or two ahead; the girl herself was a wraith, even though their hands were linked.
He said, “I think we’d better go in, you know.”
The Possessors Page 17
